No Invitation to Spain's Parade for G.I.'s This Year

By MARLISE SIMONS

Published: October 7, 2004

American troops have not been invited to show the flag and march in Spain's national holiday parade this year, Defense Minister Jos?ono said on Tuesday.

Instead, it will be French soldiers who join the military parade on Oct. 12, which is also when Spain celebrates its armed forces day and commemorates Christopher Columbus's first sighting of land in the Americas.

Americans troops were first invited to join the parade in 2001, as a gesture of solidarity after the Sept. 11 attacks, by the former conservative prime minister, Jos?ar?Aznar, who forged a close bond with President Bush.

It became a custom, it seemed, as a small group of American soldiers marched again in 2002 and 2003.

But this year, a new center-left government came to power and, as one of its first public steps, it announced it was withdrawing Spanish troops from Iraq, infuriating Washington. The pullout came in response to overwhelming popular demand, but it earned Madrid a strong reprimand from the Bush administration.

Defense Minister Bono, who was himself told off during a visit to Washington earlier this year, said in an interview on a Spanish radio station on Tuesday that he decided not to invite the Americans because ''it is a national holiday, not a U.S. holiday, and there is no obligation to parade the flag of another country, such as the U.S., which, of course, is a friend and ally.''

He made a scathing reference to former Prime Minister Aznar, who was often described as a ''vassal'' of Washington by his critics.

''The alliance with the United States continues,'' Mr. Bono said, speaking on Cadena Cope radio. ''What does not continue is the subordination and the kneeling'' before Washington.

John Law, a spokesman at the United States Embassy in Madrid, said that for the past three years a small ''honor guard'' carrying an American flag had participated ''and we were happy to do so.''

''But the U.S. was not invited this year,'' he added.

The United States still retains important military bases in Spain. But the substitution of French troops for American is being widely read as an antiwar statement. France was one of the most outspoken opponents of the American-led invasion of Iraq.